


Musings on One Son

by Christmasrose66



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-07
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2020-01-06 06:25:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18382805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Christmasrose66/pseuds/Christmasrose66
Summary: the thoughts of several characters after the events of the Season 6 episode "One Son"





	1. Fox Mulder

He sat with his head in his hands, slumped. His eyelids heavy, exhausted, but his mind was racing. He could almost feel the sparks of activity as neurons fired, and synapses connected a chain of thought. "What if...?" "What if Diana lied to him?" "What if she had always been lying to him?" Was he really a fool, for believing they had shared a common purpose, striven towards a common goal. Her presence had soothed him, but now that sweetness left a bitter taste in his mouth. She got under his skin, an itch he wanted to scratch, or perhaps a poison slipping through his veins.   
He had been amused, flattered by Scully's response to Diana. He found it hard to believe that Scully was really jealous. That's why he joked about it, because to believe that Scully was really jealous, would be to admit the possibility that Scully had feelings for him. And that was nuts, wasn't it? He found it increasingly difficult to keep his thoughts about Dana Scully purely professional, and that decontamination shower certainly hadn't helped. He knew he shouldn't have sneaked a peak at her, kept saying it to himself, over and over, "Don't look, don't look", but he knew he was going to look, and he did. Just a quick look, barely more than a glance, he couldn't help it. His mouth was suddenly very dry. Dana Scully, naked and wet, "Oh God!" He rubbed his temples, forcing himself to feel the pressure of his fingers, reality intruding on fantasy. What a mess, what a complete mess his life was.


	2. Dana Scully

Something about that woman just got to her. Scully bit her lower lip, and tried to rationalise the visceral response the mere presence of Diana provoked in her. Scully was professionally confident, she could argue a point of debate with anyone, hold her own against experts in a variety of fields, but Diana's air of confidence was different. There was no doubt that she was intelligent, but her skills were manipulative, and specifically she used her sexuality to charm men. Mulder couldn't see it, he was under her spell. The man who saw conspiracies everywhere, caught like a fly in a spider's web. But Scully could see it, and what had she done? Pointed it out to him, in no uncertain terms, like a jealous girlfriend. She felt her cheeks flush, and put a hand to her face. Yes, her cheeks were hot, there was no one to see her blush, but she still felt foolish. She wasn't one hundred percent certain of the nature of Mulder and Diana's relationship, but there was certainly "history". Why did she let that get to her?  
Of course, she knew that Mulder had an existance before they met, but honestly, Scully hadn't given it much thought, until she was forced to consider it by the intrusion of outside events. That was how she saw it, Diana intruding upon the life and work that she and Mulder shared. The life they shared; this is what her life had become. Her work was her life, and now that work was Mulder's quest. He permeated every aspect of her life. Years ago, she had accused Mulder of being "territorial", but wasn't that exactly what she was doing now? What if her behaviour drove him away, straight back into Diana's arms. Why should that bother her? She and Mulder were partners, two professionals working together. Her stomach contacted involuntarily. That feeling in her guts told her she was fooling herself.   
When Diana reappeared, Scully had resorted to logic, to try to produce a counterargument to convince Mulder of Diana's dublicity. She had even gone to the Lone Gunmen, to enlist their help. And they had been eager to help, which had to suggest something, didn't it? Her feelings about Diana weren't purely irrational (or maybe the Gunmen were so used to irrationality, they didn't question it). Sometimes, the way Mulder looked at her wasn't just territorial, it was ..... more than that. She had seen that look he had given her, when they had had to take contamination showers next to one another. But she would always be secondary to his quest, she told herself. A perpetual "mistress" next to his true love ; the search for the truth.


	3. Marita Covarrubias

She was cold, it felt like every inch of her body was being pricked by needles of ice. Her fingers felt thick and stiff, she fumbled with the edges of her hospital gown, trying to pull the fabric closer. Her eyes stung, every blink felt like sandpaper across her eyeballs. She didn't dare to rub her eyes again, it only made things worse, (not better). She shrunk back into the darkness, the light hurt, both physically and mentally. The tests were all conducted under the white glare of modern medical facilities. She had spent far too long in that sterile environment. She felt safer in the dusty storage areas, desparate to hold onto a reality beyond the treatments. She was barely herself anymore, nothing beyond her name remained. She had become a puppet, a play thing, used and tossed aside. Poisoned by treatments for an illness she didn't have, her body ravaged, thanks to the miracles of modern technology. She knew that her appearance was frightening, she was a reminder to her captors of the failure of their endeavours. There was no successful vacine. Marita was a casuality of a war they couldn't win. Despite everything they had done to her, she was still alive, she refused to give up. She had always been strong willed, had a stubborn streak, from childhood onwards. Some part of her refused to die, fought tooth and nail to hold onto life. Even this, painful, desparate life.   
Unlikely as it seemed, Jeffery Spender had offered to help her escape. Desperation creates strange bedfellows. Jeffery seemed weak, but he was a better man than that snake Krycek, who would have sold his own grandmother to help himself, but refused to help her unless there was something in it for him. He repelled and attracted her in almost equal measure. But she had to get out of that place, and you have to do what you have to do, to survive.


	4. Jeffery Spender

He'd been played for a fool, this whole charade, was a series of stories within stories, dismantle one, and there was another one inside, like Russian dolls, or paper mache masks. Nothing was as it seemed. The certainties he'd held onto for years were gone. He believed that he was a realist, a person with a firm grip on an unchanging reality. His mother was a woman of nervous disposition, who's ill health caused her to believe every crazy theory out there. He loved his mother, because he was a good son, but he regarded her as childlike, needing to be protected. More fool him! He had thought his mother needed protecting from charlatans and from herself, but now he found himself on shifting sands. As a boy, he looked up to his father, a man who instilled firm discipline at home, and didn't suffer fools gladly. Jeffery followed his father into law enforcement, wanting to make his father proud of him, even as he came to realise that their methods were different. Jeffery was his mother's son, and every reminder of his mother seemed to drive a wedge between father and son. Jeffery was conscientious and thorough in the mundane tasks that his job involved. He had scoured the X-Files with a fine-tooth comb, and inspite of his initial inclinations, he admired the work ethic of agents Mulder and Scully, and found himself persuaded by at least some of their otherwise inexplicable case files. It didn't matter what he did, he would never be the son his father wanted, and frankly, he didn't want to be that man. At last he realised that he needed to stand up for what he believed in, to protect his mother and to stop behaving as a pawn for his father.   
When he came back to the airforce base and walked into the empty room where his mother should have been, he clutched at the bedsheets, forcing himself to accept the reality. She was gone, she had been taken. And the men who had taken her, worked for his father. That was it, that was the final straw. Jeffery was on his own now, no "protection" from his father.   
"Help me, please" the woman's voice barely more than a whisper from the shadows. Jeffery turned towards the sound, his eyes straining to grow accustomed to the dark. A pale figure, a woman, hunched against some cold wind that only she could feel. Her hair unkempt, a shock of blonde, and as he drew closer, although she shrank away from him, he could see that her eyes were red, bloodshot. It was almost physically painful to look at her. She needed his help, but Jeffery's authority had become worthless, undermined now by his father's power. Again, Jeffery found himself asking for Krycek's help.


	5. Alex Krycek

Idiots! All of them, they couldn't see which way the wind was blowing. Alex lived by his wits, he could take care of himself. He knew when to turn up, offer to make himself useful, ingratiate himself with the right people. Then again, it helped if you could stay under the radar. He'd been watching events at the airforce base, knew there was something going on, watching from the wings. He'd shared cigarettes with one of the guards, and wormed his way into the facility. Oh yes, he knew what was going on. It had been something of a shock to see Marita though. She'd been an attractive, powerful woman, and now she was a ghost, a ghoul, but still a woman. He grinned to himself, so Marita and that sap Jeffery needed his help? Information is power, this could all work to his advantage. He could find out things that other people wanted to know.


End file.
